


I Do Not Grant Wishes

by myownremedy



Series: Casualties [1]
Category: American Gods - Neil Gaiman, Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angels, Character Study, Gen, M/M, Metafiction, Mythology - Freeform, Sadness, Series, feelings!!!!, ifrit who was also a cab driver, originally for class, post 9/11, salim the cab driver
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-24
Updated: 2012-07-24
Packaged: 2017-11-10 14:31:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 822
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/467357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myownremedy/pseuds/myownremedy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Salim blinks back tears. ‘I wish you could see what I see,’ he says.<br/>‘I do not grant wishes,’ whispers the ifrit, dropping his towl and pushing Salim gently, but irresistibly, down onto the bed.”<br/>— Neil Gaiman, American Gods, pg.190</p><p>What happens to the Ifrit after he leaves New York.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Do Not Grant Wishes

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [Я не исполняю желаний](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5020531) by [sige_vic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sige_vic/pseuds/sige_vic)



> Disclaimer: All quotes are from the anniversery edition of American Gods. Characters copyright to Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett, I made no money, it's canon that they're gay, no copyright infringement intended, blablabla.  
> The title is from that first quote.  
> Includes my theory on how Ifrits and djinn and such came about in the American Gods universe; it's mentioned in the writings of Islam but this is a fictional take on that explanation.  
> edit (4-13-15): this is a transformative work. I make no money off of it. I do not own what inspired this work (American Gods, Good Omens), but I do own this work itself and hold full copyright over it. Thank you.

A being of fire does not belong on a plane.

This is an unfortunate truth that is universal, and even people who don’t know that Ifrits are real will agree with it. The lady sitting next to him shifts uncomfortably, and he adjusts his sunglasses.

“Would you like the window seat?” he asks. She flinches.

“N-No. It’s fine.” He hears: _the aisle is safer_.

It’s weird – they are afraid of him now, when before they took no notice to him. Perhaps it is because he is no longer driving a taxi. Perhaps it is because he is sitting next to them as an equal, eager to be on his way back to Oman.

He stares out of the window and wonders if he should miss America, if he should miss New York.

He doesn’t. But neither is he terribly excited to return to Oman, to his homeland.

He feels…tired.

 

The feeling of tiredness does not abate, even after the plane ride is over. He is eager to move, eager to stretch his legs. The suit jacket stretches uncomfortably tight over his shoulders. Flames lick his eye sockets. He is impatient for the woman next to him to leave. When she does and when he exits the plane and skips customs – he is an Ifrit, and such things are beneath him – he feels the desert sun hot on the back of his neck.

He starts walking, away from the airport. Away from the city. Away from people. Away. Into the desert. He abandons suit jacket and tie, abandons shirt and shoes, and walks in the direction of the sunset. He does not leave footprints. The sunglasses rest in the sand behind him

 

It is written on ancient scrolls that Ifrits were created from smokeless fire by Allah. But with many things that are written on ancient scrolls, this is not true.

 “Aziraphale,” he says.

Aziraphale is not really the pudgy, blond man that turns to look at him. Aziraphale is an angel and, indirectly, the sire of all jinn.

“So you have returned,” Aziraphale says quietly. The Ifrit wonders why Aziraphale looks the way he does. He has long since assumed his true shape – a shimmering form with wings and eyes of fire. But the Angel in front of him looks human. And very guilty.

“I have,” the Ifrit says. Then: “You did not have to come and see me.”

“I feel responsible for you,” the angel replies after a moment. “It was my fault that your race was created.”

 

It was true. Aziraphale had held the flaming sword and guarded the garden of creation, and when Adam and Eve had left the garden, he had given the sword to them. What the angel had not known was that the sword had become imbued with the spirit of creation – and how could it not be, when it guarded Eden so thoroughly?

When Adam and Eve had wandered into the barren desert and squatted, cold on the desert sands, they had driven the flaming sword, point first, into the sand. And it had created the Jinn.

 

But the Ifrit does not care to remember this, because it was long ago, and he had come here to die.

“I wish you could be happy,” Aziraphale hazarded, because of course he knew why the Ifrit was here, why the Ifrit had returned to his homeland. He knew that the Ifrit did not want to compete with others that are only half sustained by the waning beliefs of their people. He wants only to die in his desert and not care about anything, anymore.

“I do not grant wishes,” the Ifrit whispers, because it is true, because he never has. He does not have that special power.

He thinks, unbidden, of Salim, who had a pure heart and beautiful eyes, who loved fiercely and easily, who he had left sleeping in the hotel with his fake ID. He wonders if Salim is angry with him for stealing Salim’s identity, or if he realized that he had tried to give Salim what he wanted most: a way out.

A wish and the thing you want the most is different, he thinks. And perhaps Salim will have not understood.

He hopes that Salim understood.

 

“Many of your siblings live in the city,” Aziraphale says after a moment. “Join them. You can live there, sustained on the belief of your people.”

“No.” The Ifrit did notice that Aziraphale’s command was disguised as an order. But the Angel is only an Angel, and a Jinn does not have to obey an Angel.

“No,” he says again. “I will stay here.”

“Alone?” Aziraphale looks very unhappy, and he shifts from foot to foot, not noticing that he is hovering slightly above the ground.

“Yes.” The Ifrit looks away. “I wish nothing more than to be alone.”

“Oh,” Aziraphale says quietly. “You must have forgotten. You are not a granter of wishes.”

**Author's Note:**

> visit me on [tumblr!](http://marnz.tumblr.com/) prompts welcome.


End file.
